With the House Away, the Senate will Play: Plans to Define 'Gender Identity', Increase Minimum Wage

With the U.S. House in recess this week, the radical oligarchy that is the United States Senate will have free reign to dismantle the civil society.  While everyone is focused on the economy and the loss of health insurance, they are passing a bill granting special rights to all sorts of “sexual identities.”  Unfortunately, there is no leadership on the Republican side to inspire unity within the conference against this terrible piece of legislation. Once again, this week will show how we need new leaders in the Senate.

The Capital is mirrored in the Capital Reflecting Pool on Capitol Hill in Washington early Tuesday, Oct. 1, 2013. (AP Photo/J. David Ake)

Legislating Immorality

As more Americans lose their jobs and health insurance from Obamacare, the Senate will continue to ignore their plight. Instead they will focus on a bill that treats transgendered and cross-dressers like a protected class.

The Senate plans to reintroduce the deceptively named Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA), S.815, which essentially invites lawsuits on private employers who refuse to accommodate the subjective and transitory behavior of various “gender identities” – among them transsexuals and transvestites.  For the purpose of the bill, the term “gender identity” refers to “the gender-related identity, appearance, or mannerisms or other gender-related characteristics of an individual, with or without regard to the individual’s designated sex at birth.”

This bill will open up a Pandora’s box of litigation against private business owners who decline to hire people with outlandish behavior and problematic decorum. Moreover, even the paltry religious protections in Section 6 of the bill only cover religious organizations, not individual businesses. Furthermore, even religious churches and schools will not be safe from frivolous lawsuits given that this bill confers on all “sexual identities” the same civil rights status as African Americans.

Photo Credit: AP

It is also important to note that once a sexual identity can be defined as any subjective desired orientation, “with or without regard to the individual’s designated sex at birth,” there is no limit to what can be included under the mandates of the bill.

In recent years, the American Psychiatric Association (APA) has been moving away from designating pedophilia as a mental disorder. Just last week, their most recent publication seemed to imply that pedophilia can indeed be classified as a sexual identity or “sexual interest.”

Taken as a whole, this bill will continue the work of destroying the civil society, infringe upon liberty – religious or private, and encumber small businesses with frivolous lawsuits.

The cloture vote will occur later today. One would think that such a radical off-topic bill would only garner fringe support.

But the reality of today’s Senate is that there is bipartisan support for fringe legislation. All 55 Democrats, including the phony red state ones, are voting for the bill. Also, Republicans Susan Collins (R-ME) and Mark Kirk (R-IL) are co-sponsors of the bill, and Senators Orrin Hatch (R-UT) and Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) voted for it in committee.  Senator Dean Heller (R-NV) has already signaled support for cloture.  There are a number of other Republicans in play.

Conservatives should contact the following senators and tell them to show a backbone against the destruction of religious liberty:

Rob Portman – (202) 224-3353

Kelly Ayotte  – (202) 224-3324

Dean Heller – (202) 224-6244

Pat Toomey – (202) 224-4254

Orrin Hatch – (202) 224-5251

Lisa Murkowski – (202) 224-6665

Jeff Flake – (202) 224-4521

Also, Senators McConnell (202) 224-2541) and Cornyn (202) 224-2934) need to hear from us. It’s time for them to do their jobs and preserve some semblance of Republicanism in the Republican Conference.

Minimum Wage Increase

Later in the week, the Senate might consider yet another minimum wage increase bill, S. 460.  The bill would raise the minimum from $7.25 per hour to $10.10 after two years, indexing future increases to the rate of inflation.  Obamacare has already

In this photo taken, Aug. 1, 2013, demonstrators protesting what they say are low wages and improper treatment for fast-food workers march in downtown Seattle. (AP Photo/Elaine Thompson, File)

successfully trimmed back workers to part-time and eliminated a number of jobs. Minimum wage laws accomplish nothing but cropping out part-time jobs for teenagers and slow economic growth.  f raising the standard of living was as easy as the federal government waving a magic wand, why not raise the minimum wage to a more respectable $15 per hour?  As with every other liberal idea, Democrats will start out with 55 votes, and have a number of Republican options to reach 60 votes.

Executive/Judicial Nominees

Last week, Republicans in the Senate finally found the backbone to block some of President Obama’s radical nominees.  All Republicans except for Richard Burr (R-NC) and Rob Portman (R-OH) voted against cloture on the nomination of Congressman Melvin Watt (D-NC) to be the next Director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA).  During his career serving on the House Financial services Committee, Watt has been a consistent advocate for expanding the role of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac into the private housing market.  It would be a disaster for him to serve as the top regulator of those failed agencies as director of FHFA.  Conservatives must continue to block his nomination until Democrats agree to wholesale reforms of the GSEs.

Republicans also blocked the nomination of Patricia Ann Milett for the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals.  This is the second most important court in the country, as it has original jurisdiction over a lot of the constitutional issues with legislative and executive laws.  The court is currently split between Republican and Democrat appointees.  Unlike other courts, this one actually has a very light caseload burden.  There is no reason to stack the panel with another Obama radical.

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